District Nursing Service
Posted: Sun Jul 10, 2011 12:56 am
The Country District Nurse
If you listened to the gossip down the street or at the mall,
That someone had been hurt, or had a fall,
You could bet your boots that she was there
With her navy blue bag, and her hat on her hair
Right up the front with those who did care,
Giving attention, and helpful to all.
She had to get her facts right so she could tell it true
How it happened, what was where, and who was who.
Opening her pad she’d begin to write
Of all she had heard and saw at the site
She had to make sure that she recorded it right
For it could mean a lot to you.
She retired, because the government said the service was not needed,
But it did not stop her giving to her district, for she heeded
Their calls, when the doctor was far away
In the city, at the clinic, each and every day.
He personally paid his Nurse to stay
And continue the service, unimpeded.
When she got older and with fading sight
She did not stop caring or turning wrong into right
Whether around the corner or across the park
She knew which dog was worse than its bark,
And if you weren’t home until well after dark,
She would keep her light burning all night.
Her happy cheerful nature is no longer seen in town
When they seek her for advice, she can’t be found.
Her memory remains with the children, now grown,
And if they snuffle along with a cough and a groan,
With no nursing service like the one they had known,
They drive to the clinic; city bound.
©
A salute to the Queen District Nursing Service
This Service of essential nursing, highly underrated and underfunded by our governments is still struggling to survive in this day of the proposed 'Super Clinics'. The District Nurses and country Doctors are increasingly, more remote from their patients. Doctors ring for the ambulance to transport their patients to city Hospitals because country town Medical Centres are amalgamating. Regional Service used to be calculated in square mile/kilometers, now it seems it is 'bums on seats'. This may work in city and suburbs, but not in our Australian country and outback.
I wish the government would leave, 'what ain't broke' alone.
If you listened to the gossip down the street or at the mall,
That someone had been hurt, or had a fall,
You could bet your boots that she was there
With her navy blue bag, and her hat on her hair
Right up the front with those who did care,
Giving attention, and helpful to all.
She had to get her facts right so she could tell it true
How it happened, what was where, and who was who.
Opening her pad she’d begin to write
Of all she had heard and saw at the site
She had to make sure that she recorded it right
For it could mean a lot to you.
She retired, because the government said the service was not needed,
But it did not stop her giving to her district, for she heeded
Their calls, when the doctor was far away
In the city, at the clinic, each and every day.
He personally paid his Nurse to stay
And continue the service, unimpeded.
When she got older and with fading sight
She did not stop caring or turning wrong into right
Whether around the corner or across the park
She knew which dog was worse than its bark,
And if you weren’t home until well after dark,
She would keep her light burning all night.
Her happy cheerful nature is no longer seen in town
When they seek her for advice, she can’t be found.
Her memory remains with the children, now grown,
And if they snuffle along with a cough and a groan,
With no nursing service like the one they had known,
They drive to the clinic; city bound.
©
A salute to the Queen District Nursing Service
This Service of essential nursing, highly underrated and underfunded by our governments is still struggling to survive in this day of the proposed 'Super Clinics'. The District Nurses and country Doctors are increasingly, more remote from their patients. Doctors ring for the ambulance to transport their patients to city Hospitals because country town Medical Centres are amalgamating. Regional Service used to be calculated in square mile/kilometers, now it seems it is 'bums on seats'. This may work in city and suburbs, but not in our Australian country and outback.
I wish the government would leave, 'what ain't broke' alone.
